


the more things change, the more they stay the same

by fanfoolishness (LoonyLupin), LoonyLupin



Series: Starshine Over Beach City: Moments from Steven Universe [27]
Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Bleak, Gen, Homeworld (Steven Universe)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:14:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21755089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LoonyLupin/pseuds/fanfoolishness, https://archiveofourown.org/users/LoonyLupin/pseuds/LoonyLupin
Summary: White muses on the changes that have come with Era 3, and the complicated feelings she has regarding Steven.  Mild spoilers for up to "Volleyball" from Steven Universe Future.
Relationships: Steven Universe & White Diamond
Series: Starshine Over Beach City: Moments from Steven Universe [27]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1523993
Comments: 20
Kudos: 155





	the more things change, the more they stay the same

Change. It is all around her now, humming in the halls of the palace, sung from thousands of throats. It is the song Steven Universe has ushered in with Era 3, and White listens in mingled wonder and confusion. **  
**

There are so many things she struggles now to understand. The concept of compassion. The strangeness of self-determination. The joys of freedom, reflected in the faces of her former court. The smiles of Blue and Yellow. And Steven himself — not Pink, not anymore — baffling, brilliant, beautiful.

He is so _strange_. She sees flashes of Pink in him in the smallest ways: a giggle, a tilt of his head, a playful leap into the air. And yet his organic nature is utterly foreign to her, his bizarre needs to eat and sleep, his body chained forever to its human frailty. She studies him with great fascination. She was so _wrong_ about what and who he is, and the thought shakes her to the core.

She tries to apologize to him, once, for what she did to him. She sits beside him, her vastness almost comical beside his diminutive form, and she makes the attempt. Her words catch, clumsy and disconnected. There is nothing perfect about them.

His reaction startles her. Always, he is a surprise. _You just didn’t know,_ he says fiercely. _You didn’t understand what it would do — what it would do to me —_

It isn’t true, of course. She had known all along how fragile his organic form would be without its gem. But she looks carefully at him, and his face is pale, his small shoulders trembling. She doesn’t understand why he says what he says, but she knows enough to see he needs to believe it. 

She lets him keep it. They do not speak again of the day she took his gem, and she wonders if perhaps he has grown past her mistake. She hopes to do so also.

She fights to learn so many new things. She had thought there was nothing new remaining in the galaxy beyond their empire’s further attainment of perfection, but being wrong, in _this_ at least, has been… almost invigorating. She works at Steven’s alien lessons, and Blue and Yellow and all of their Gems — all of _the_ Gems, _theirs_ no longer — work too. She will hide no more, though the change is slow and painful.

She is not the only one who changes. What she sees in Steven is gradual when measured against a human lifespan. She observes it in the way his human body grows, the confidence ringing in his voice, how Gems turn to him and follow even as he speaks of independence. 

She could not control him now even if she wished to. Could she ever have?

She begins to hear whispers, rumors of troubling things from Steven. Flashes of anger. A voice raised and powerful. His form flickering pink. The threat of destruction, barely bridled. The rumors leave her with mingled feelings, pride and disappointment both.

She watches Steven, and she sees Pink in the dark of his eyes, the power in his Gem. She sees the leader Pink never was on Homeworld, and the leader who carried out a revolution on a backwater colony. She sees Pink’s anger, once legendary, humming beneath the surface of Steven’s smiles.

He is not Pink Diamond. She knows that now. But he is _a_ Diamond. 

A Gem’s true cut will always shine, will it not? 

Perhaps there are things that do not change, after all.

**Author's Note:**

> I think Steven is becoming more like both White and Pink all the time *gulp* Eager to see what happens next in Steven Universe Future.


End file.
